BANNED SECT

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXVII, Issue 23818, 20 November 1940, Page 11

BANNED SECT

JEHOVAH'S WITNESSES PROVOCATIVE CONDUCT PRIME MINISTER'S COMMENT [El' TELEGRAPH —PRESS ASSOCIATION"] ■WELLINGTON, Tuesday "The Government has not interfered in any way with the right of people to worship according to their religious beliefs and conscience," said the Prime Minister, the Rt. Hon. P. Fraser. when his attention was drawn to-night to the cable message from Sydney stating that the headquarters of Jehovah's Witnesses for Australia and New Zealand had sent a cablegram to the King protesting at the ban imposed on the organisation by the New Zealand Government. "If the body called Jehovah's Witnesses would confine themselves to ordinary religious observance, like the Churches and other religious bodies, they would have full liberty to do so, and there would be no interference with them whatever," said Mr. Fraser. "However, difficulties in New Zealand arose through Jehovah's Witnesses constituting themselves a propaganda body against other Churches and thereby causing widespread ill-feeling, resentment and bitterness, which resulted in at least one unfortunate incident in this country. "Such provocative and incitement would be inimical at any time and cannot be tolerated during war time, when the greatest amount of unity and co-operation among the members of all religious faiths is essential. "There has been no interference with the right to worship, but there has been a prohibition imposed on the dissemination of literature and other propaganda directed against religious organisations," concluded the Prime Minister.